Celebrating the HP-35 Calculator With a New Model

An anonymous reader writes "Hewlett-Packard last week announced a contest whereby HP-35 fans create and submit videos of their favorite calculator memories. HP will choose the best videos and you can win a 50-inch, high-def plasma TV. But everyone wins, because HP this summer will debut a special new calculator model. The details aren't announced, however, it's likely to be a 35th anniversary edition of some sort."

As easy as 1 ENTER 1 +

[The Monster]

I loved RPN. It was kind of like running Linux; if someone asked to borrow my calculator, they'd freak out because they couldn't find the equals key, and I'd have to explain how to use the thing.

Geeky stuff for the un-geek

[EmbeddedJanitor]

RPN is pure geekiness isn't it? Wrong! Amazingly, the most popular RPN calculators are the HP11/12 which are for beancounters!

I learnt to program on an HP29C overalmost 30 years ago. 98 instructions (well keystrokes) of programming and only a few registers forced you to be pretty frugal, although at the time we thought that was pretty plush compared with the HP25 whiuch had half the memory.

As I type this, I have an HP48SX and HP28S on the desk in front of me. Great devices. My kids both use HP48s for their

Re:

[ari_j]

Dude...what the heck kind of managerese is "overalmost"? What does it mean? I'm so lost.

Cash registers

[metamatic]

If you broaden your definition of "calculator", the most popular RPN calculators are the cash registers you find in stores. For the benefit of those who have never worked retail, I'd better explain that most cash registers work by having you enter the price, then push a button which equates to "+" on an RPN calculator.

Similarly, for 3 items at $3.99 you push $3.99 [enter] 3 [multiply]. Watch carefully next time you buy stuff at a store that doesn't use bar code scanning yet.

Re:

[Vegard]

Me, I think the 42S was the best thing that ever came out. Still have it, although since I'm more or less always by a computer now, and don't have that much advanced mathematic needs either, it's not been much used the last 10 years.

One of the best thing about them, was their durability. They were nearly unbreakable.

Before my 42S, I had a 10C (which I later gave to my brother), and a 15C, which I still have.

(yes, these were all scientific versions)

- Vegard

Re:

[flyingfsck]

Hmm, I never have problems with people borrowing my calculator. Even supposed computer scientists can't figure it out.

Re:As easy as 1 ENTER 1 +

[flyingfsck]

BTW, that should be "1 Enter Enter +".

Re:

[AK Marc]

"1979135.87 enter 1979135.87 +" vs. "1979135.87 enter enter +".

Which again is as many strokes as having the last two strokes as "2 *".

Re:As easy as 1 ENTER 1 +

[ross.w]

Yoda you must think like, if effectively these calculators you wish to use.

Re:

[Majik Sheff]

That's why I carry my trusty 33s. I've sold many of my co-workers and associates on RPN just by running circles around them on complex calculations. They're parsing parentheses and I'm writing numbers. It is sad that yet another part of HP that made it great is all but dead. HP is dead, long live Agilent. (though I can't complain about my LaserJet 5si)

Re:

[TheGavster]

This is why they developed 'graphing' calculators that just accept expressions typed as written. TI even has a line of scientific calculators now that have a single line display that handles complex expressions.

Re:

[zippthorne]

48 and 49 *show* four element stacks (well the 49 will show fewer if you turn on algebraic mode, but only because formatted equations take up space). But the stack is limited only by available memory (or some very large number) afaik. I have no experience with any more recent HP calculators, and haven't used either of those series in a long time either, having largely abandoned graphing calculators: they're not nearly as useful as you'd think, at least for math. A simple scientific calculator is often mo

Re:

[Detritus]

It's a compromise. Three levels is too small and four levels is sufficient for most tasks. The architecture was designed when every transistor was precious.

Funny...yes...however.....

[StressGuy]

This is a valid point.

Besides being a very efficient way to enter formulas into a calculator, one of the nice things about RPN was that people didn't want to borrow your calculator.

Of course, mine was an HP41-CV .... which will date me a bit

"35th anniversary edition"

[AirLace]

Wouldn't it be great to see an innovative new calculator design from HP to mark the 35th anniversary rather than a re-hashed "special edition" of some classic design?

Re:"35th anniversary edition"

[AstrumPreliator]

Well as far as I know they've shut down [hpcalc.org] their calculator division. So unless they opened a new one somewhere else I doubt this will happen.

Re:"35th anniversary edition"

[644bd346996]

They have introduced several new models since closing the ACO. They have a pretty small staff right now, but they are producing. Manufacturing is handled by Kinpo, and R&D is handled by Cyrille de Brebisson. Bernard Parisse, author of the 49 series CAS, is no longer an employee but he is still developing new software, such as a recent geometry app for the 49/50 series. And many of the other former ACO employees are still active on comp.sys.hp48.

The state of calculator development?

[cgenman]

Can anyone update an old timer as to the state of calculator development? When I was getting out of these things, it looked like TI and HP were going to have a duel to the death. With color LCD's on the verge of availability and the Power PC line of low-power chips set to overtake the world, it looked like a bright future of powerful visualizations.

Fifteen years on, it looks like the high-end calculator market has all but been abandoned to mathematica. Prices for the calculators haven't budged a dollar,

Re:

[ClosedSource]

I think TI won the duel simply because a high-cost, high-quality approach like HP used made it difficult to successfully market new calculators with new features. If you paid a premium for your HP and the keys still don't bounce after a decade or more of use, it's hard to go out and buy a new one unless there's a pretty compelling reason. If you buy a TI, you'll probably have to replace it within 3-5 years whether you want to or not.

Re:

[SL Baur]

If you paid a premium for your HP and the keys still don't bounce after a decade or more of use, it's hard to go out and buy a new one

Yeah, a very fair assessment of HP quality (with their calculators). I lost my '41s after moves, but my original 41CV was still working great after 10+ years, as is my 48G - 12 years and counting.

Re:

[kestasjk]

Here in Australia Casio Color calculators are the ones most high school kids get, and which are in most universities. It has 3 colors, with graphs, matrices, recursive functions, lists+statistics, and has a BASIC like program syntax.

I wrote a couple of programs for it (see my website ^) which show the syntax and what it's capable of.

Personally I think they're good, but progress has been comparatively slow. It's still slow and expensive, with a small screen and small memory, when compared with the incr

Re:

[644bd346996]

I'd say that HP is the only company to take advantage of newer technology. Most of TI's graphing calcs still use Z80s, and the high end uses 68k. All of HP's current graphing calculators use Samsung SoCs with an ARM9 core that goes up to 200MHz. HP has started to take advantage of the integrated peripherals by adding the SD slot (enabling me to store the complete documentation for every app and the calc itself on a 1Gb card) and USB. Hp has also left the device open to hacking, so it can be programmed in C

Re:

[Hognoxious]

I was thinking that too. I have an old Psion 5mx and the spreadsheet has NPV APR and all those TLAs that beancounters love built-in. Is there anything I'd need to get a 12C?

Re:

[SL Baur]

the last thing I want to see is some "Innovative new calculator design"

I don't agree with your other statements, but I can almost agree with this one. I did HP-34C, HP-41, HP-48. They were wonderful tools. I still program the old '48 from time to time and I wish that they would continue with their calculators so I can give new ones to my sons when they get old enough. Handhelds are a great introduction to programming.

Let's see an updated 48GX

[El Cubano]

But everyone wins, because HP this summer will debut a special new calculator model. The details aren't announced, however, it's likely to be a 35th anniversary edition of some sort."

I love my HP 48GX. I'd love to see an updated 48GX with a faster processor and more memory. Mine is 11 or 12 years old and I still like it better than anything that has come since then, including all of TI's offerings which many schools prefer. With all the advances in semiconductor technology, you could pack a lot more memory and performance into the same package. Hopefully we won't have to wait for a 48th anniversary edition.

Re:Let's see an updated 48GX

[644bd346996]

Get a 50g. The only downside compared to the 48 series is the lack of a large enter key. Otherwise, they have everything you have dreamed of: 75Mhz ARM9 processor, 2.5MB flash, SD slot, IR, USB, and serial comm, a CAS that is almost as good as a desktop app, and they can draw power from your computer via the USB cable. C compiler provided separately [hpgcc.org].

Re:

[ciggieposeur]

Between a good friend and I we have about 6 HP48 calculators, including (drum roll) one of the very last 48GX's ever made STILL UNOPENED in package. I've got two GXs and one G, he's got 2 GX's and an SX. He's also got a 50. The 50 lasted about six weeks into his electrical engineering coursework before the keys began breaking -- and it had already been replaced once under warranty. My main 48GX has survived the worst of a chemical engineering undergrad and still going strong.

The moral: the 50 is really

It's the 49G+/50

[EmbeddedJanitor]

The HP48 keyboard layout was pretty good. Though the 48Gii,49G+ and 50 are a lot faster, the keyboard has been stuffed up. Now there's the small Enter/= key instead of the "proud to be RPN"-sized Enter key that was on the 48 and previous RPN devices.

Re:

[SL Baur]

Now there's the small Enter/= key instead of the "proud to be RPN"-sized Enter key that was on the 48 and previous RPN devices.

I never thought of it that way, but you're right.

Programming-wise, they did away with enter a long time ago. It was described as a way to terminate numeric entry and recommended HP-41 programming practice was to never use it in a program as there were other, faster ways to do that.

Re:

[DilbertLand]

Yikes, looks like the going rate for a used 48GX on ebay is $150-200. I'm glad I have a spare one tucked away if my main one ever actually dies. Of course I'd still be willing to pay that much if mine needed replacement.

TI

[Enderandrew]

Someone other than TI makes high end calculators that people buy?

Wow, I must be really ignorant, but because every school across the country seemingly pushes TI use in school, I didn't think people used anything else.

Re:TI

[644bd346996]

...because every school across the country seemingly pushes TI use in school, I didn't think people used anything else.

I don't see how one implies the other. What engineer would take a high school teacher's calculator recommendation at face value? Public schools use TIs because TI markets to the teachers. Ten years ago, all engineers used HPs because HP marketed to engineers and professionals. Then Carly Fiorina took over and killed the HP calculator business for a few years. But they are now back in the game and developing new models that are once again very good products. If you can be bothered to learn RPN, you will never buy TI for yourself again.

Re:

[mrchaotica]

What engineer would take a high school teacher's calculator recommendation at face value?

One that was brainwashed by growing up using Ti calculators in school.

Re:

[644bd346996]

It wouldn't be the TI calculators that do the brainwashing. They aren't that bad. The real problem is that public schools do not encourage the development of critical thinking skills, and thus do not enable students to question their teacher's stupidity. That also happens to make most high-school grads incapable of becoming engineers. These days, the unlearning of bad things and the learning of simple things (like handling units) take up so much time in college that many students never catch up enough to re

Re:

[bm_luethke]

You will almost never convince someone who has not used an HP in a job what you wrote - TI's worked fine in school so they should everywhere else.

My father is a land surveyor, he and the engineers he works with have lamented for ages about the lack of good calculators. They treasure their hp48's and 41's like a child. Most have several stockpiled. Many also grew up using TI's, but once they found the "older" HP's none ever looked back. I prefer my old 48 over my 49, but I sacrificed it to my father's busine

Re:TI

[pyite]

A person who has spent time with an HP will run rings around someone with a TI on almost any calculations

It's been a few years, but I remember in things like physics labs where you have to do a lot of number crunching, all of my lab partners would always plug along dutifully on their TIs while I would have done the calculation twice (once and then a double check) using RPN on my 48GX. I don't use a calculator much anymore, as MATLAB tends to be quicker for the things I need to do, but whatever HP lacks in computational power, it makes up for in efficient syntax.

Re:

[olman]

I don't use a calculator much anymore, as MATLAB tends to be quicker for the things I need to do, but whatever HP lacks in computational power, it makes up for in efficient syntax.

And that's the problem for fancy calculator-business, really. HP48 (got 48G right here!) is great for some basic arimethic and also for straightforward 1st degree equations when you need to find a component parameter that will work for your circuit..

However, when it gets a bit more complicated, you either need access to some very

Re:

[Rich0]

Uh, have you ever used an HP-48? You can enter equations in algabraic form (infix), and bring them up in the graphical equation editor on-screen. They can easily be saved on the stack or in variables. And, you can use RPN to compose an equation using symbols (X enter Y + Z / gives you (x+Y)/Z). Often if you're making up an equation that is how you end up thinking anyway (take this, multiply it by that, etc).

How are the TIs with vector arithmetic? One thing I loved about the HP48 was the ability to trea

Re:TI

[Rob the Bold]

Wow, I must be really ignorant, but because every school across the country seemingly pushes TI use in school, I didn't think people used anything else.

Back in the day when HP still made calculators, everyone else -- TI included -- played second fiddle. HPs were the premier pocket (or belt-loop pouch) calculator from the early Seventies to the mid nineties, more capable, more durable and more desirable than TI, Casio, or any other pretender.

Too bad they abandoned the market and now only sell rebranded units from Asia. Check http://www.hpmuseum.org/ [hpmuseum.org] for the complete history of the HP calculator.

Re:

[smellsofbikes]

Yeah, kind of like how colleges in the '80's pushed Macs, which is why nobody ever uses anything else...

Sure, business majors probably use TI's. As I said elsewhere in this thread, I work in semiconductor design, and the only TI's where I work are the ones sitting around in the lab gathering dust. All the design and apps engineers have HP calculators from the '80's, and use them every day. However, our receptionist uses a TI.

Probably the 41CV

[ewhac]

I think it may be the HP 41CV, which was essentially a pocket computer in calculator's clothes.

Personally, I'd much prefer seeing a re-issue of the HP 11C or 15C. Landscape layout (great for two-handed use), compact, RPN, and lasted forever on three button cells.

Schwab

Re:

[ClosedSource]

I'd like to see a programmer's calculator like the 16C but with an alphanumeric display and programming capability like the 41CV. After programming the 41CV with the alphanumeric display, I couldn't stand scrolling through a program on the 16C and having to map numeric keycodes to functions.

Re:

[644bd346996]

They won't re-issue the 41. There would not be enough of a market for the expanability. Here's to hoping they release a beefed up 42 with IR and/or USB. Or a 15c. I don't really care, as I would buy both in a heartbeat.

FYI, the 42s was essentially the 41cv sans expansion slots, but with a 2 line dot matrix lcd and a much thinner package.

Re:

[Detritus]

They still make N batteries. They are just harder to find. I've had good luck finding them at Radio Shack. I have some old HP clamshell calculators that use them.

PLEASE DON'T USE THOSE DAMN CHEAP KEYS

[xtal]

Hello HP;

I am among the last in a long line of engineers who have been lucky enough to be exposed to the OLD HP. The HP run by engineers, that made great test equipment, and calculators. The HP that made great calculators with excellent tactile feedback. You know, one of the only reasons to USE a dedicated calculator.

My HP48GX was purchased in the summer of 1994 before I started my electrical engineering degree. It followed me through every exam and project I have done since and proudly sits on my desk today where it continues to be used daily. I own a 48G I boughts as a spare; and happily run the emulators you have so nicely provided the ROM for, including on my very speedy Palm T3.

I also owned a great HP35, and a HP100LX that I used daily for years. All of these devices had the great, tactile response keys and indestructible construction.

So please, for the love all that is holy and good in the universe, do not make another fisher price calculator. Please make another quality business calculator, and PLEASE consider making an updated version of the best engineering calculator that ever was - the HP48GX.

Re:PLEASE DON'T USE THOSE DAMN CHEAP KEYS

[644bd346996]

The 50g is anything but a fisher price calculator. I have a [dead] 48gII and a 50g, and the improvement in quality is (obviously) like night and day. I do believe they are done with the crappy keyboards of recent years.

Also, they never stopped making quality business calculators. The 12c has been on the market continuously for more than 25 years.

I remember the HP-35...

[SiliconEntity]

I remember when the HP-35 came out. It was the cover story in (I think) Popular Electronics magazine. It was incredible, an entire slide rule in this small electronic device. It could do trig functions, roots, powers, all to enormous precision. My mouth watered, but I was in high school and it was like $300, which would be more like $3000 today. My friend and I used to bike over to the local university bookstore, where they actually had one on display, and you could punch the buttons and everything.

I never

Mac's Service Shop, March(?) 1972 PopTronics

[calidoscope]

I remember reading that same article and getting really excited about it (was a senior in high school). And similar to your experience, ended up getting the HP-45 and using it until about 4-5 years - replaced by grpn. The intro price for the HP-35 was $395 when you could still buy gas for less than $0.30/gallon and the lowest price for a new car was just under $2,000.

BTW, Mac's Service Shop was a holdover from Electronics World which was folded into PopTronics in 1970. I did keep my copy of the issue with

Bring back the HP-16C!

[billnapier]

http://www.hpmuseum.org/hp16.htm [hpmuseum.org]

I need a calculator that can do hex, and shifts, and bitwise operations. I mean I love my TI LCD Programmer [datamath.org], but I really miss the shift operations...

Re:

[corsec67]

The Sharp EL-9600C has a mode where it does math in Binary, Octal, Decimal and Hex, ... at the same time. It is the only good feature of that calculator, which is quite slow other wise, but it does have a touch screen.

41cx!

[Anonymous Coward]

The HP41cx was THE best calculator ever made by humans.

Nothing before, nor after, touched it, IMHO.

Anybody else remember the PPC ROM?

Re:

[SL Baur]

(The 41CX was the world's finest handheld, perfected)

Anybody else remember the PPC ROM?

Yeah and "synthetic" programming. Made me decide to go into computer programming rather than electronics.

Slashvertisement Alert!

[rm999]

"But everyone wins, because HP this summer will debut a special new calculator model."

Subtle...

Bah!

[GFree]

I suppose me and my loyal Ti-89 are not welcome in your HP love fest, huh!

/me storms out

RPN

[ross.w]

I never got the RPN hang of

Re:RPN

[moosesocks]

Wow..... you just made me realize that RPN is essentially the Latin grammatical syntax applied to math.....

(For the uninitiated, Latin sentences typically go: Subject -> Direct Object -> Verb (with an indirect object optionally thrown in before or after the DO))

Alternatively, rearrange the phrase as you'd hear Yoda say it.

Re:

[ari_j]

You should have picked a language with strict word order rules. Latin is one of the most flexible languages out there in terms of word order. However, the more common word orderings from Latin seem to have become rules in some of the Romance languages. For instance, 'te amo' in most of them where there are probably 12 ways to order the words for the same sentence in Latin. ;)

Re:

[iocat]

I don't know sh*t about calculators, but I do know a bit about language, and here's a handy rule for you: the more detailed the word endings and forms, the less word order matters. That's true for almost every language. You can see this both ways in modern English, if you compare it to what I think of as "immigrant English," which frequently eliminates word endings for various reasons.

For instance, I could say, to a native english speaker, "handed me the man did a book" and it basically makes sense, becau

Re:

[AK Marc]

I expect the influx of immigrants to English-speaking countries will probably exacerbate that trend in the coming decades, as it seems to be easier to remember word order rules than word form rules.

For the Chinese, that would be very true. There are no word forms. All words are fixed with no tenses, no gender (save for the gender-specific words themselves, like "man" or "woman"), no conjugation at all, not even plurals. Having learned some Chinese, I can now read the bad signs with clarity (aside from

Re:

[Vegard]

Nope.

I never (enter) hang (enter) the RPN (enter) of got

Btw, anyone that like RPN should *really* take a look at the postscript language. It will all feel natural.

- Vegard

crud!

[TinBromide]

Gah! My grandpa was a civil engineer and after he passed, we went through his personal belongings, among them was a non-working hp-35 final model (i realize this now from the pictures on a link in the original article).

Had i realized that it was such a landmark calculator, i would have stowed it away for tinkering later, instead i thought it was like the ti-36 of a previous era and its either in the trash or in a box in the back of a storage locker.

Re:

[sznupi]

That reminds me the horror I've heard recently...my girlfriend said, after seeing photo of HP calculator (the financial ones style) that after their grandfather died several years ago, she and her brother basically destroyed his HP calculator bevause "it was broken" (no "=").
On one hand...I want to forgive her (after all she was just a child then), but on the other...HP calcs are impossible to get/very expensive in this country ;P

The New Slashdot

[SeaDour]

News for Nerds, Calculators that Matter

I've both the 35 and 45.

[Chris Tucker]

The 45 is the daily use calculator. There are few things in this world that approach perfection. The HP-35 and the HP-45 are among those few things.

Sure, I could use PCalc [pcalc.com] on the Macintosh. I've got the free version that came with a set of OS install disks. It's a damn fine application.

However, the HP-45 is right by the keyboard. And I can operate it with my left hand and enter the results into the Mac via the keyboard keypad with my right.

And it's faster than invoking and using PCalc, too.

Who gets my HPs

The sad truth is...

[DogDude]

The sad truth is that the world just doesn't have much use for calculators, any more. The world is too busy worrying about who the Next Top Model is.

Re:

[644bd346996]

The not so sad truth is, no matter what happens, the world will eventually start throwing large sums of money at the people who can use an HP calculator, because they will be the only ones capable of keeping modern society (Internet, bridges and skyscrapers, airplanes, etc.) from falling apart.

Re:

[colinrichardday]

But my 48GX is smaller and has more battery life than my laptop. Also, doing numerical programming on the 48GX is wonderful, just put stuff on the stack and process.

Re:The sad truth is...

[Reality Master 101]

The sad truth is that the world just doesn't have much use for calculators, any more. The world is too busy worrying about who the Next Top Model is.

Yeah, I remember the Golden Era that was the 70s and 80s. All the cool people would whip out their calculators periodically and do some quick computations. Then we'd relax and watch all that stimulating television like Three's Company and Miami Vice. When we'd really want to get crazy, we'd calculate WHILE we watched Happy Days!

-sniff- The good ol' days.

HP 35C set the direction for my life

[MykePagan]

In maybe 1974 my dad, a Civil Engineer bought an HP 35C. Even though it cost a fortune (in those days), he let his 10 year old son (me) play with it. I remember being so impressed with it that it cemented my impression that HP was THE company to work for, if you were an electrical engineer.

18 years later I joined HP.

15 years after that and I'm still at HP. It's not the same place that it was in 1992, but then again what place is? I'd still rather be here than at the other computer makers, but the software and services companies are where the real action is now. Unfortunately, few of them seem to have that same "engineer's company" feel that HP did back in the day.

FWIW I don't blame Carly, though I didn't like her either. It was inevitable, with commoditization of the hardware.

My favorite calculator isn't the HP

[Kuciwalker]

Rather, it's a GNU Octave window. Really, what can beat that? And on the occasion that I need to do something symbolic I pull out a TI-89.

Only 35 years?? Pah!

[spagetti_code]

My day to day calculator is an HP-14b [hpmuseum.org]
50th Anniversary Limited Edition!, with the waaayyy coooool SWAP key. Talk
about turning it up to 11!

[joke]
And it doesn't rely on that arse-backwards RPN crap either.
HP did include an INPUT button to make engineers feel at home, although why
engineers would want a calculator with:
- time value of money
- return on investment
- inventory turnover rate
is beyond me.
[/joke]

(dons flame suit anyway because poking at beloved RPN
is dangerous around here)

What's the point?

[johansalk]

Why would one want such a calculator when you can have a PDA?

Re:

[pyite]

Why would one want such a calculator when you can have a PDA?

Because while you are recalibrating your digitizer and taking out your stylus to tap emulated keys, I will have already entered the RPN statement twice, once to run it and again to double check it.

Re:

[Quiet_Desperation]

Because PDAs are gay!

But seriously, once you learn an RPN calculator, there's nothing faster and more efficient. It's an engineer's tool. It becomes an extension of yourself.

And PDAs really are gay. :)

Re:

[johnny cashed]

false dichotomy. My calculator is a PDA. It's personal, it's digital, and boy does it assist. My HP 48 had it all, serial port, graphic screen, and with the right software, addresses and phone numbers. Built in calendar and clock to boot.

Give me a solar powered HP with RPN

[johnny cashed]

Like a 11c, 15c, or a 32sII. Ok, I can do without the solar, but I've always wanted a decent RPN calculator that I do not have to get batteries for.

Not that it is a big deal, all the HPs I've owned that ran off the button cells had excellent battery life.

Don't skimp on the keys. Even the later 32sII had printed keys.

Re:

[SL Baur]

Because they were waiting for flash memory to be invented? How can you store programs on solar power without persistent memory?

Not that it is a big deal, all the HPs I've owned that ran off the button cells had excellent battery life.

Yup.

Finally it makes sense...

[Ardipithecus]

Do the numbers as you wish, but,

I, for one, welcomed our new hp overlords

1973, Jr. year (OMG!), Florida (yes, the Gators)

$300 very hard earned real dollars went into the hp-35, maybe (judging from house and car prices) $3-5k today) and about the best money I ever spent

As they say, it let me concentrate on concepts rather than number crunching; within a year everyone had one (or the awful TIs) and engineering (and science) would never be the same. Take offense if you must, but RPN users are smarter.

Sears golden ratchet

[WindBourne]

Sears did a gold plated ratchet wrench for its anniversary. It would be interesting to see HP do something nice like that. The truth is that HP calcs last nearly forever, so why not?

Now you can have RPN calc on your mobile

[Yetihehe]

Java based RPN calculator for mobile phones. When learned, it's actually MORE easy and faster to use than typical calculators. http://midp-calc.sourceforge.net/Calc.html [sourceforge.net] (I'm not affiliated in any way with author. I just like this program and want to share with it).

TI-Nspire

[nbritton]

TI is coming out with a new calculator this fall, called the Nspire...

http://www.ti-nspire.com/tools/nspire/index.html [ti-nspire.com]

* 320x240 Gray Scale LCD
* CAS Functions.
* 16MB RAM
* 20MB Flash

Re:

[Anne Thwacks]

I would really love an emulation of this on my Nokia N61.

Which would give me 320x240 colour, QWERTY KBD and 4GB Flash.

And WIFI, GSM, sound, etc.

I can see the point of an HP memorial edition, but TI?

RPN

[awol]

I have always wondered if "stack" based thinking is inherently human or not. It can take a while to get reverse polish notation but once grokked it seems that one can hold much more of a computation in ones head (or with minimal, non answer based) notes.

I think not but I think the research would be fascinating. Long range navigation would be the most logical "selection pressure" on a disposition to stack based thinking, but in reality I think humans tend to use waypoint based navigation which is inherently

RPN Lives!

[BanjoBob]

I still use an HP-35 and an HP-67. I love the 67 and its only problem is that the magnetic card reader has died but, it is still programmable.

These calculators just run and run and run, I've never had any reason to get rid of them. Thanks to HP for some great calcs!

Of course my K&E Analon slide rule still works too! (Did I just date myself? ;-}

Bah.

[SCHecklerX]

You can have your RPN. I'll stick with my trusty old casio fx-4500P. Not a bad little machine for its time.

First Geek on Campus: Univ. of Mich.

[csfenton]

In '72, I saw the HP advertizement in Scientific American. I ordered it by calling HP directly. I had to send them a bank check for $400.00. I had to wait more than three months; into the beginning of third year in U of M Engineering school.

It finally arrived in late September.

So how did I handle it? It was the only one on campus that I was aware of. I took it to my professors and asked if I could use it in class and on exams. After they wiped the drool away, they all said yes.

It saw the greatest us

Re:Wrong calculator

[644bd346996]

No, Bring Back the 15c! [hp15c.org]

Seriously, the 15c's features were a superset of the 11c's features, with the exception of the register allocation scheme. But they can do that however they want these days.

Re:

[Jazzer_Techie]

Absolutely! I really want one of these. I switched from a Ti-83+ to a HP 33s when I got to college. But wait you say, from a graphing calculator to a scientific one? Surely that's a downgrade. I wouldn't consider it so, mainly because anything that I need to graph is complicated enough to need done via computer. I can do basic calculations on the 33s faster than I ever could on the 83+. (If you don't believe that, then you've never taken the time to master an RPN calculator.)

I have a professor who still car

16C!

[metamatic]

No, bring back the 16C! That's a true Slashdot geek's calculator.

Perhaps this posting is an opportune place to mention nonpareil [brouhaha.com], the HP calculator simulator that actually uses the original ROMs and will flawlessly emulate a 15C, 12C, 11C or 16C. I've programmed one of the buttons on my keyboard to bring up nonpareil in 16C mode.

Re:

[smellsofbikes]

I work at National Semiconductor. As far as I've seen, every engineer who uses a calculator at our design center has either an 11C or a 15C. I've had mine since 1984. There are a few TI's sitting around in the labs gathering dust, that are used for emergency addition if someone's HP managed to get left at the desk, but the TI's are shunned, generally.

I can run my 15C by touch, I've used it for so long. And, the weirdest/best thing of all is that, as I said, I've had this since 1984; it took me through t

Re:

[AshtangiMan]

! I have one from 1985 that I still use . . . from field surveying to an AE degree and now architecture the 15C does everything I need. It is the oldest piece of electronics that I own, and by far the most reliable. I shudder to think what happens if it is ever lost or damaged.

HP 11C

[dbzero]

Man, that one brings back memories...I loved that calculator.

Re:

[SL Baur]

To whomever moderated that comment -1 Offtopic. The 11 was referring to your IQ as well as the calculator model.
Someone with mod points, please fix. Thanks.

Re:

[mykepredko]

The one we did in High School:

"If Betty goes out with 5001 men and charges each one $7, what is she?"

The answer is the product and looked at upside down.

myke

Re:

[EQ]

Bigtime agreement! My 16C still smokes anything out there in terms of ease of use, etc. Setting, testing, clearing bits, and masks, settingthe type of complement you want for the math, varyign the word size up to 64 bits (before there were even 64 bit CPUS around!) - and all in that small form factor wiht a clean display and fantastic keyfeel. Simply amazing. Especially for someone that has to deal with low level devices and their custom interfaces.

I wish they would remake that one or the 15C. I miss my

Re:

[sznupi]

Not sure why, but while reading your post I thought that HP calc with e-ink display would be nice...well, definatelly no funky colors.

Re:

[Detritus]

The color scheme sucks. In recent years, HP has developed a talent for picking colors and backgrounds that make it difficult to read the legends. It also has some bugs in the math functions.

Re:

[GenKreton]

My HP33s scientific/engineering calculator does that as well. And it's one of the few approved for the Fundamentals of Engineering exam.

Re:

[SL Baur]

Amen!

32S II

[krog]

the 48GX is a good graphing calc, but the HP 32S II is still at the top of my list for engineering calculations. discontinued at about $60 new, used ones regularly sell for $125-150 on eBay. it has the sanest layout of any calculator I have ever touched, and all the operations I need to use are very fast to key in.

the ugly-ass 33S was designed as a replacement, but it offers negative improvement.

I love the 32S II so much, I wrote a /usr/bin/dc variant called dci [sf.net] that comes close.